Our Reliability Expertise focuses on managing systems and equipment through harmonizing the interconnection of cost, risk and availability. Reliability is an enabler that bridges strategic improvement through solutions targeting areas of throughput losses. Applied at a tactical level, reliability focuses on causes of unwanted cost to the business. These solutions are balanced through adoption of the client’s risk tolerance.

Key Challenges

Unexpected equipment failures cause a high level of corrective maintenance work orders​

65%

of the time equipment strategies are outdated and the PM tasks not effective​

Master Data has been incomplete for many years.

A comprehensive roadmap is missing to develop a holistic Reliability Strategy​

Our Strategy & Solutions

T.A. Cook’s teams of specialized consultants, engineers and development coaches provide a unique approach to operational challenges to develop and implement reliability programs that increase and sustain our clients’ profitability. Each project is run by T.A. Cook with client participation throughout and governed by clear accountabilities, milestones and expectation of measurable benefits. The first 25% of the project focuses on design and definition of the detailed activities with associated resources to reach challenging but achievable goals.

During the core phase, we switch to finding specific solutions, improving processes and organizing for success. Where in-house knowledge and answers are not readily available, we are able to bring a range of best practices, tools and techniques which are transferred to the client organization and provide the basis for continuous improvement. During the last 25% of the project, the foundation for genuine sustainability is set through audits, checks and iterative improvements.​​

Our Service Offering

Current State Analysis & Benchmarking​

The most successful organizations have effectively incorporated reliability into their daily operations, much like a safety culture, and not viewed it as a project. But does meeting defined targets most of the time really mean your reliability practices are best in class? To find out if you are top of the league and to identify areas of improvement we will take an in-depth look at your current practices. The short benchmark-analysis of reliability processes, methods, tools, organization and systems is the basis to determine areas of opportunity, the associated benefit potential and agree approach and road map to enhance future reliability performance.

Reduce Corrective Maintenance Work Orders​

There are many reasons why a high number of corrective work orders exist. Take into account equipment failures are a combination of human and process factors that must be addressed to see a reduction in corrective work. How are the maintenance plan quality, work package quality, craft skills, operator skills, work order management process, production windows, for example possible contributors? Applying a robust suite of business tools allows the identification of these sources and to categorize these opportunities by those that impact production. This enables a review and prioritization of those events that return the highest benefit to production. A robust implementation roadmap is created to identify all organizational touch points for risk mitigation. ​

Improve Equipment Reliability​

There are many reasons why equipment fail. High equipment failures are a combination of human and process factors that must be addressed to positively impact cost. It is common practice to perform a bad actor analysis with the tendency focusing on reducing costs associated with physical asset management, while other sources tend to be overlooked. Cost data is the starting point for understanding a bad actor, however, converting that into actionable information is where improvement begins.

Equipment Strategy Development​

Equipment strategies encompass more than maintenance plans and all strategy elements must be defined, developed and executed for sustainable benefit. We’ll apply our expertise to efficiently and effectively assess your existing equipment strategy for improvement, as well as, create new equipment strategies using our modular approach to equipment strategy development/improvement. This modular approach will shorten the timeline for development, thus reducing resource requirements and cost to implement.

Review and Optimize Master Data​

Data is the basis for any improvement. Master data is the data source for many of the project work streams and used for daily operating decisions. Without the required data or accuracy of the existing data any reliability improvement initiative will not deliver the expected benefits. After a brief review of the current situation, our reliability specialists integrate into your team and support with a hands on pragmatic approach and proven techniques to get your master data up to date and develop a program to keep it that way.

Reduce Reliability-Driven Throughput Losses​

Production losses are realized from multiple sources and can be difficult to identify. If data exists for some or all of the events leading to a loss, how do you determine which event to address? Applying a robust suite of business tools will allow the identification of these events and to categorize these events by those that impact production. This enables a review and prioritization of those events that return the highest benefit to production. An implementation road map is created to identify all organizational touch points for risk mitigation.

Spare Parts Optimization​

Many organizations spend large amounts of time and money trying to improve plant reliability by, for instance, increasing inventory of critical spares and trying to procure better quality components. Reliability improvement is, however, a process that touches many departments in your facility that may have different performance goals that don’t always align with the goals of reliability. Typically, these include a requirement to reduce working capital and cut purchasing costs, which in the short term at least might have a negative impact. We will help assess the true criticality of equipment and performance requirements such that inventory and component holding policies are optimized while the long-term conditions for reliability are improved.

Provide an Holistic Reliability Strategy & Roadmap​

Our reliability experts will assess the current state of the organization, processes and its ability to deliver a balanced approach to reliability, incorporate the desired improvement to create an integrated improvement roadmap that includes the required steps to achieve the stated benefits.

Reliability Engineers Staffing as a Service​

As an independent service provider, we support customers in the process industry with reliability professionals for short term staffing or longer term staff augmentation. With long-term experience, in-depth know-how and proven methods in reliability project preparation and implementation, we can take overall project responsibility or assist with workstream specific tasks. Hiring flexibility, access to enhanced skill-sets and experience, faster position staffing, and control are just a few of the benefits realized using staffing as a service.

Featured Insights

Failure Mode and Effect Analysis can be used to assess all possible failure modes, but often falls short in providing a detailed cost analysis of commonly recommended tasks. Watch our webinar to learn effective methods for bad actor cost tracking and analysis from expert Colemann O'Malley.

Excessive scope and poor scope control are STO performance killers. In most plants, the reliability engineers have access to the data and possess the analytical skills to evaluate the condition of the equipment. Learn how to best utilize your reliability engineers in our webinar. Watch the recording

"Cost data is the starting point for understanding a bad actor,” says industry expert Lance Bisinger, “converting that into actionable information is where improvement begins.” Join our webinar for an expert lead discussion on utilizing the analysis to identify contributors to poor equipment reliability. View recording

Research suggests that the best STO managers come in at 10% below projections, while the worst STO managers come in at 60% above projections. Watch our webinar with an expert lead discussion on why good outcomes are hard to come by and how to better your odds